Category: Mob Mentality

Earlier this week we invited a group of our LA-based creators to swing by our new office in West Hollywood and get to know some of the VidMob team. We feasted on hearty barbeque and sipped on cocktails, as we learned more about the talented people that make up our community.

We were blown away by the enthusiasm and above-and-beyond dedication of our creators. Their excitement and passion for what we’re building, their insights for how to grow the platform, and their down-for-anything hustle meant so much to hear in person. We’re so lucky to have them on our team!

It was also great to see both old and new faces alike—from those that have been with us from the very start and those who’ve recently joined the ranks. Providing an opportunity for our creators to meet in person and get to know one another was a fantastic way to not only learn more about the similarities and differences, but also to foster our growing creator community.

Even VidMob West’s office pup, Burt, got in on the action.

Many thanks to all who attended! We feel so lucky and energized after meeting with our community. We learned a great deal by getting everyone together to share their stories, discuss how they use the platform, and get to know one another. We can’t wait to announce some of the exciting updates we have coming your way as a result of this event, and we look forward to hosting our next meet-and-greet!

Stay tuned for our next creator mixer, which will be held at our headquarters in NYC. Want to attend? Reach out to us at support@vidmob.com to get on the invite list and receive event updates.

For those of you who’ve been looking forward to our updated collaboration feature since we hinted at it back in January, we’re happy to say that it’s finally here. Now—thanks to a few tweaks and some long nights from our tech team—creating, managing, and participating in group collaborations is easier and more powerful than ever before.

A Look at the New Group Collaboration Features

Collaboration—no matter what the project—can be a messy and complicated endeavor when not executed properly. Such is the nature when working with multiple participants! Therefore, management is key in creating any successful group collaboration…VidMob projects included.

So we set out to create collaboration features that made managing collaborators roles, input, and interaction as simple and straightforward as possible. Which will make leveraging the power of group storytelling and experience that much more effective for our users.

How did we do that? By implementing a role assignment feature that allows the project owner to dole out different levels of interaction with the project details, editor communication, project drafts, and payment.

Collaboration Roles

The roles are broken down into five types of collaborators, each with their own unique set of abilities and actions within the project:

Project Owner: initiates collaboration by inviting others to join his or her project. A project owner maintains complete control and direction over the project, just as they would in a non-collaborative project.

Co-Owner: assigned by the Project Owner, Co-Owners have all the same capabilities as a Project Owner with the exception that they cannot view or hire available editors.

Full Collaborator: like Owners and Co-Owners, Full Collaborators can access the collaboration Group Chat, add notes to media, and add/delete additional media, view all drafts, and share/download final project. However, they are exempt from the Editor Chat.

Limited Collaborator: the default role given to all collaborators when invited to join the project by the Project Owner. Limited Collaborators can chat, add media, and view the final project. They cannot, however, view drafts, add media notes, or participate in the Editor Chat.

Media-Only Collaborator: ideal for collaborators that you only need media from or for projects you’d prefer to maintain total control over. Media-Only Collaborators cannot view drafts, add notes to media, delete media, or view/share/download final projects. Assigning collaborators to this role is ideal for larger crowd-sourced projects, say for big brands or organizations, or for wedding projects, where you’d prefer the final draft to be a surprise for all your guests who collaborated.

Chat Messaging

Communication is another key factor for successful collaboration. So we knew designing strategic avenues for communication between both collaborators and the editor were going to be crucial (and help make our users’ lives a whole lot easier!)

The Group Chat: was designed to make messaging between the Project Owner and their collaborators less complicated. Now, if a Project Owner wants to test the group’s pulse on a recent draft, project notes, or overall project vision, they’ll never have to leave the app to do so. And if a Project Owner would prefer to do away with the Group Chat, it can be easily disabled.

The Editor Chat: is for the Owner and Co-Owner only. For this reason, we recommend limiting the amount of Co-Owners you assign to any given project, as too many cooks around the pot could cause unwanted confusion for your editor and unnecessary delay in draft delivery.

Split Pay

We knew this feature would be especially important for those users that invite lots of contributors. Because, in any group project, if the responsibility and contribution is equally shared so too should the cost be equally shared.

Similar to how Uber allows its users to split a payment amongst those sharing a car, so too can our users split the payment of their joint project amongst those collaborating. And doing so is quite simple:

How to Use Split Pay

1. Assign your collaborators to their appropriate roles before initiating split payment. This will ensure that you can decide as a group on your budget for the project.

2. In group chat, decide amongst your collaborators how much you would like to spend on the project (either per person or total cost of project).

3. In the role assignment screen, select the collaborators you’d like to invite for split payment.

4. Send the invite and wait for your collaborators to accept. Sometimes, sending a friendly “nudge” reminder may be necessary.

5. Upon acceptance of an editor, the total cost of the project will then be evenly split amongst all who have accepted the project owner’s split payment invitation.

Use Collaboration to “Wow!” with Your Next Project

Now that you’re all caught up on our collaboration updates, it’s time to test out these new features for yourself!

If you’re looking for a little collaboration inspiration, we’ve got a few ideas and examples below:

Weddings/Honeymoons: No videographer necessary when you can use VidMob with all your guests! Watch a “familymoon” example here.Sporting Events: Watch this video the Sacramento Kings posted to their Facebook Page using crowd-sourced content here.Family Holidays: Preserve your holiday traditions and memories in video. Like Team VidMob did this past Thanksgiving here.Travel: Remember your vacations from everyone’sperspective, like this family did here.

And for an inside look at where in the app you can locate these new features, watch our Collaboration Feature Walkthrough below.

We hope that you are as excited about these app updates as we were in creating them for you! Let us know in the comments below how you’ll be using these new features to improve your group collaborations. And for more updates and project inspiration, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

We hope as VidMob grows that our editor community will grow and thrive right along with us. And to ensure that this happens, we want to do our best to give our editors the tools they need to promote their work and find success within our platform.

Which is why we’ve recently built the “Share Profile” feature in your Editor Profile within the Edit Suite. Now, editors can promote their portfolio work by easily sharing their VidMob editor profiles online—and hopefully attract a slew of new clients in the process.

Here are a few tips for sharing your profile in order to gain the most reach:

1) In an Email: Sending your editor profile link in an email to all your friends and family is a great way to put the new work you’re doing with VidMob on your team’s radar. And, hopefully, if they know someone who is in need of video, they can easily forward along the right editor for the job!

2) On Social Media: This is arguably the best channel to promote the work you’re doing, given how far-reaching these social networks are. Because, who knows, that friend of friend from high school just might be in need of a great video editor.

3) With a Video: When sharing your profile, also consider featuring a video that you’ve really proud of (and that you have permission to share!). This way you can attract interest, show off a greater scope of your talent, optimize your post, and lead viewers to your editor profile.

And the best part? If someone views your profile and clicks your “Download app to hire [Your Name Here]” button, not only will you automatically be added to their list of favorites, but you’ll also show up as the first bid on every project they create (so long as the project fits your auto-bids).

Editors, to check out your editor profile and get sharing, log in to the Edit Suite here. And don’t forget to tag VidMob in your profile shares for a chance to be featured on our social pages!

As we’ve seen happen on our platform again and again, all it takes is one—just one—video to convert a new app user into a regular, satisfied customer. It is this evidence of the power of video that keeps us going. Because we know that, in time, VidMob will soon become saturated with plenty of users creating video after video after video.

We also believe that the same goes for our editors. All it takes is one—just one—job to show our editors just how easy and satisfying it is to find work through our platform.

Just as there are many questions and curious excitement surrounding a user’s first experience with our app, so too has there been many questions and curiosity surrounding the feedback we’ve received from those editors who feel “in the dark” as they await their first job. And it’s amazing—simply amazing—to see how the experience of a first job is all the light that needs shining to show editors why we work the way we do.

So while we’ve strived to answer all our editors’ questions as best we can, we thought we’d shed some real light, from a real VidMob editor, on much of the feedback we’ve received.

We chatted with Sam C. on how his first job with VidMob went and his feelings about the platform. Sam is a video editor from the New York Metro Area who has 10 years previous video editing experience with NBC and also works freelance.

Here’s what he had to say:

Why I love VidMob:

VidMob saves me time and money by finding the jobs and handling the billing process for me. I can spend more time practicing my craft and less on marketing and invoices.

1) What are your goals for using VidMob?

I want to expand my client base into a market that was unreachable before VidMob came along.

2) Do your goals and the growth trajectory for VidMob as a platform align? (why/why not)

Yes, as VidMob pursues more high end business clients, we will grow together.

3) What is your favorite (or least favorite) part about the platform?

My favorite part of the platform is how little effort I have to put into getting jobs. I also appreciate being able to name my own price and getting paid promptly without chasing after clients.

My least favorite part about the platform is not being able to see a list of jobs I’ve auto-bid on.

4) What advantages or special opportunities do you see happening because of VidMob (if any)?

I see VidMob opening up a market that didn’t exist before. People are recording more media than ever and so much of it goes unused. VidMob is a place for people to go and get something special made out of all the photos and video they take.

5) How have your clients been to work with? Did it meet your expectations?

Clients have given me the freedom to be creative and use my imagination to create something personal for them.

6) What has surprised you most (whether good or bad) about VidMob so far?

I am pleased to see that on a platform where editors are competing for jobs, my rates have remained fair.

We hope you enjoyed hearing what member of our editor community has to say about VidMob, and we hope it helped to shed a little more light on not only how our platform works but how we intend for all of our editors to feel upon receiving their first (and the many more to come!) job.

Did you enjoy hearing from a VidMob editor? Let us know in the comments below or by reaching out to support@vidmob.com.

We are beginning to roll out some new features for the Edit Suite that we think will make our editors’ lives much easier. I am going to outline just some of the features here (as there are too many to list), so keep an eye out for other improvements. If you have any feedback or ideas for improvements you would like to see, please let us know at support@vidmob.com.

Tool Tips: Column headers throughout the website now have more information available if you hover your mouse over the column title. For instance, if you hover over the “Drafts” column, you will see some explainer text saying, “The max number of drafts made available to the user for this bid.” These Tool Tips will appear on the “Find Jobs,” “My Auto-Bids,” “My Manual Bids,” “Work in Progress,” and “Completed” tabs.

Improved Search: On every page with a search feature, we have added a much more powerful search engine. You will now be able to search through every displayed field at once. For example, if you search “animals” and “puppy,” you will see every project in the “Animals/Pets” category that has the word “puppy” in the title.

Data Tables: You’ll now be able to sort each column, so you can better locate the perfect projects for you. We have also changed the way these tables are constructed, and they have a new feature that will actively search while you type. These will appear on the “Find Jobs,” “My Auto-Bid,” “My Manual Bids,” “Work in Progress,” and “Completed” pages.

Proper Pagination: We had a bug in the system that, in searching through pages like “Find Jobs,” you would continuously be sent back to page one. This will no longer happen, and we have implemented this change on numerous pages throughout the site.

Other Small Changes: We made numerous small changes to help eliminate a lot of the confusion we were hearing about. For example, we have changed “Media Length” to “Total Raw Media Length.”

These are just a few of the changes we have made, but you’ll definitely see more as we begin rolling out the update. We are constantly working to make VidMob the best and most helpful platform it can possibly be, and we can’t wait to hear your feedback on this latest version.

With the year coming to a close and the new one fast approaching, we’ve been thinking a lot lately about not only how far we’ve come but, more importantly, where we hope to be in the year ahead.

Given that this time last year VidMob was basically just an idea, we look excitedly towards 2016 to see how we’ll change, grow, and evolve even further. Because we want our community to play an active role in shaping the development of both our app and Edit Suite, we wanted to share with you a little forecast about what we’re working on in 2016. We hope that this will not only give our community something to look forward to, but will also allow you to think thoughtfully about how we can build this platform to really work for you.

As a company enthralled with video and video editing, we see great potential in the untapped market of the millions (literally) of smartphone users that either already are or are capable of capturing great video content—meaningful video content that could become that much more meaningful with a talented video editor’s touch.

In fact, it’s this future potential that gets us most excited about 2016: to spread the word about VidMob with the hopes of changing the very way we capture and remember our lives. Just how apps like Instagram changed the way we take and share photos, or the way Uber changed the way we get around town, we too hope to change the video atmosphere by empowering anyone with a smartphone to capture their lives in video and to connect those people with talented video editors excited to help craft their stories.

As we’ve learned in the past year, making great change takes time. Building an idea into a platform and a concept into a community didn’t happen overnight. Turning an untapped market into a reality by evolving consumer behavior won’t happen overnight either, as we’ve learned in the short month since we’ve launched. Instead, tapping into this market and encouraging smartphone users to look at how they capture their memories differently, is the biggest uphill battle we’ll likely face in 2016. Yet it’s a critical one.

Luckily for us and those who know the power of video, all it takes is one video to make this fundamental change. One video to turn those millions of smartphone users into regular, active video creators that will bring in as many jobs for our editors as Uber has drivers, or Instagram has trending hashtags.

So here are a few of the ways we’ll be working in 2016 to make these changes happen. To bring in lots and lots of work that would’ve never existed otherwise. To build something amazing, together.

Collaboration: We’re working hard in 2016 to improve the collaboration functionality of our app to make the experience for all who collaborate as exciting, fun, and, well, collaborative as it currently is for the project owner. Thanks to a lot of our early user feedback, we hope that these improvements will help make every user’s experience with VidMob feel more connected. Additionally, we hope that these improvements will give new users and collaborators a sneak peek into the process and encourage them to make their own awesome videos. The changes will include things like collaborator group chat, cost sharing, the ability for collaborators to view and comment on drafts, the ability for project creators to post a “brief” for collaborators, and much more.
MobFeed: Like Instagram’s “Explore” feature, we too want to show off and promote the most buzzed about videos in order to not only promote the great work of our editors, but allow people to create viral collaboration projects. To get this where it needs to be, we’ll have to move away from the current simple feed to a display schema where we can add an editorial point of view. We think this will make the MobFeed more fun, more useful, and better at highlighting editors so that consumers can ‘favorite’ them for future work. As part of this redesign, we’ll also add the ability to highlight weekly “best of” videos for each category, promote public collaborations, and much more.
Web Interface: While VidMob will always be a “mobile-first” product, we realize that many of our users also have media on their home computers. And not all of them use cloud accounts like DropBox. So we plan on rolling out a web interface, which we expect to be equally integral as our VidMob Pro service expands (see below for more on VidMob Pro).
Android Version: We expect this sometime in Q2 of 2016. Now all smartphone users can get in on the action!
Consumer Music Review: VidMob has licensed over 100,000 tracks for people to use in their videos. But today, only the editors can preview and search through that library. We’re working on a way for consumers to browse this catalog on their own, and then make recommendations to their editors.
Enhanced Manual Bidding: We have heard MANY requests from our editors that they want to make manual bids. And while we remain convinced that auto-bids are the best tool for finding work on our platform, we do recognize that there will be certain situations where a manual bid makes sense—for example, if a consumer has already worked with an editor and wants to hire her again, he could just ping her for a manual bid on his next project. This puts the editor in a position of not only being likely to win that bid (and thus hopefully not waste time on unwinnable bids) but also helps to connect the consumer and the editor in a relationship with greater visibility.
VidMob Pro: We’ve touched on this in the past, but it’s such an important part of our future that we thought we’d highlight it again. In short, this is the first of our product expansions (like Uber’s expansion to offer Uber X, Uber Black, etc.). To-date, most of our projects have been consumer projects. But over time, we expect the majority to come from businesses looking to fill their social channels regularly with the content they need now (and forever after).
VidMob Now: More to come on this front in 2016…but you can probably make a good guess based on the product name.
Certifications and Visual Search: This is a feature that we’re actually really excited about—the ability for editors to ‘level up’ into new credentials and badges that will expand their desirability. For example, this might include a GoPro-certified editor, or someone who has received ten or more 5 star ratings. Over time, users will be able to easily search based on the specific badges, certifications, and credentials that matter most to them.

This is just a peek into what’s coming down the pipe. What do you think? Now do you understand why we’re so excited for 2016? Here’s to a happy New Year for all, made all the happier through the amazing power of video!

While this past month has been an intentionally quiet one, we’ve still had a few rather exciting happenings. So, before we give you some much-requested statistics on winning bid prices and project averages, let’s take a peek at the past month’s big highlights: